"How do you know of this place?" the guerilla demanded, eyeing me with even greater suspicion, unslinging his XZ-47. "Only the leaders and a few select guards know of this place."
Obviously, I couldn't tell him that I'd merely stumbled onto it. Well, I had fooled Colonel Vasco with the story about a special assignment from Captain Rodrigues. I would move up in the chain of command.
"I was told of it by Colonel Vasco himself," I said, looking brazenly into the peasant face and keeping a sharp eye also on his hands that clutched the Russian rifle.
"And why did he not give you the password?"
"As I told you," I said, pretending exasperation, "I have been two days on the trail. I was not able to receive today's password."
He looked me over good, checking to see if the uniform really was mine, I supposed. The uniform fit like a glove, but the man still didn't seem impressed or convinced.
"Whom do you seek?"
"On orders from Colonel Vasco," I said, emphasizing the name of the obviously dreaded and feared military leader, "I am to locate a man by the name of Antonio Cortez and to bring him to headquarters."
The guerilla studied me much the way the colonel had studied me, trying to assess the depth of my stupidity, or my shrewdness.
"This Antonio Cortez," he said, slowly, clutching his rifle and walking through the opening of the jungle wall. I peered around him and saw that he was alone, that the thick vines and underbrush he had so easily moved rode on a wooden platform with huge rubber tires. It was an effective and ingenious camouflage. "Who is he and why is he so important to the colonel?"
I shrugged and looked as stupid as I could manage. "I am but a courier. I don't involve myself with the reasons behind the commands of my betters."
The guerilla laughed, coughed and spat up a wad of phlegm. The wad landed on my right boot. As I was studying the situation down there, trying to decide if he had done that on purpose, the guerilla swung his rifle and caught me in the forehead with the butt. I went down, my eyes watering from the blow, but still painfully conscious.
"You stupid fool," the guerilla said, shifting the rifle around and jamming the muzzle into my throat. "If you had come from Colonel Vasco, you would know the password. He gives it to the couriers the night before the change. Sometimes, they have a week of passwords in their knowledge, just in case they are on the trail when the regular troops are given the daily change. And, if you were from the colonel, you would know that Antonio Cortez is in the stockade, scheduled to be shot at noon today, along with twenty two other troublemakers and would-be deserters." He pressed harder with the gun barrel, almost cutting off my wind. "Who are you and what do you want here? Be quick and be truthful, my friend, or you will never be anything else but food for the maggots, scorpions and ants in this jungle."
I was about to ask why he would cheat the pigs out of a good meal, but decided flipness wasn't called for just now. Besides, he hadn't yet guessed that I was an American. That was good — or was it? Perhaps the truth would give me a few more minutes of life. There was no way I could reach and use Wilhelmina, Hugo or Pierre before this man pulled the trigger of his automatic rifle and reduced me to an entree for insects.
"I am the American everyone seeks," I said, corrupting my Spanish a bit to convince him of my gringo status. "I want to be taken to Colonel Vasco. I have important information for him, about an American attack being planned."
His eyes widened, but he didn't ease back on the rifle barrel. It was still jammed into my windpipe. I had spoken those words in a kind of falsetto, gasping for enough air to breathe, much less to talk. His eyes narrowed again and the grin was back.
"My instructions are to…"
"I know your instructions," I said, gasping out the words. "Disembowel all Americans and feed them to the pigs. But I have important news for the colonel. You'll be in great trouble if the news doesn't reach him in time."
He eased back on the rifle, but didn't lower his guard. "Why were you coming this way when the colonel is in the opposite direction? And what is this business about taking Antonio Cortez to see Colonel Vasco?"
I knew I couldn't do Antonio any more damage, especially since he was to be shot at noon. I would involve him more deeply in my web of truth and lies.
"Antonio Cortez is one of the key contacts for the Americans being sent to Nicarxa," I said, moving away from the rifle and sitting up on the ground.
The rifle moved back to my neck, forcing me to lie supine again. The guerilla's scowl was back.
"Cortez is just a boy," he said, sneering. "What could he know of Americans, of being an important contact. He is nothing, a peasant lad who fell into the wrong company and got himself a death sentence for his opposition to the great Don Carlos."
"Zapata was only nineteen when he set out to destroy the tyrannical rulers of Mexico," I said, drawing on my knowledge of revolutionaries.
"And he was killed for his efforts."
"But only after great successes in the field."
"True. All right. Stand up. Do it carefully. I will take you to my chief and let him decide what to do about you."
As I stood, I pressed the trigger release on Hugo and the stiletto slid easily into my hand. But the guerilla kept his rifle aimed at my throat and I had no chance to charge him. We moved through the fake opening in the jungle wall. Once that opening was Closed, I knew my goose would be cooked. This man's chief, I knew, would radio Colonel Vasco and, when the two compared notes, the colonel would know that I was the man who had fooled him. In his ire, he might well order me shot, disemboweled and fed to anyone or anything that happened to be hungry.
The bearded guerilla lowered the rifle and reached for a handle to roll the intricate gate back into place. It was my moment. I stepped in close, knocked the rifle aside and, before the man could call out, I rammed Hugo into his throat, twisted, gouged and pulled sharply upward. He died instantly and my remorse was minimal.
I pushed the opening aside again, dragged the guerilla's body through and back down the trail. I pressed my way into the jungle wall beside the trail, dropped the dead body in a thicket and arranged the undergrowth so that it didn't look as though it had been disturbed in a hundred years. It would take them days to find him, and then only by following their noses.
Once inside the compound, though, with the camouflaged gate back in place, I had no idea where to go, no idea how many more guerillas were between me and the stockade where Antonio was awaiting execution. Once again, I would have to follow my own nose and hope that it didn't lead me through minefields or up against men like Colonel Vasco.
It took only a half hour to find the stockade. Suspicion seemed to drop away from the guerillas now that I was inside the compound. It was inconceivable to them that any unauthorized person could make it this far; and the Cuban uniform kept them in awe. They were afraid to challenge the Cuban Marine sergeant who walked with a purposeful step and seemed to know precisely where he was going and what he was doing. Little did they know that I was a babe in the wilderness. A dangerous babe, but a babe nonetheless.
The stockade was recognizable by its high, barbed-wired fence, the armed guards around its makeshift gate and the scraggly, woebegone unarmed peasants peering out through the fence. I strode up to the guards and was pleasantly surprised when they snapped to attention. It was a plus gained for me by the arrogant Cubans and I decided to make best use of that plus.
"Bring the prisoner Antonio Cortez to the gate," I ordered in my best Cuban Spanish. "He is to be interrogated regarding information he may possess about an American who has come to Nicarxa to interfere with the revolution."