Donald Hamilton: The Ambushers

I drew a long breath. "I will open the case if you repeat the order, Colonel. But afterward I won't guarantee the results."

He nodded. "Very well. Get some sleep. It is not very practical to travel the jungle at night. In the morning we move."

"Yes, sir," I said, and started to turn away.

"Senor Helm."

I looked back. "Yes?"

"This silica of which you speak," he said curiously. "What is it?"

"It's a desiccant," I said. "Silica gel. It takes moisture out of the air. When it has absorbed all it can hold, you have to heat it in an oven to restore its efficiency. But we're not apt to be here long enough to make this necessary."

"No. We should reach the village of El Fuerte by tomorrow afternoon." He took the new cigar from his mouth and regarded it thoughtfully. "Silica gel. The wonders of North American science applied to the problems of Central American rebellion. Good night, Senor Helm."

FUERTE MEANS STRONG in Spanish, and it would make an interesting project for some statistically minded graduate student to determine just how many lawless gents have come out of those monkey-and-orchid jungles calling themselves El Fuerte, The Strong One. This particular contender for the strong-man title of Costa Verde was named Jorge Santos, pronounced Horgay. He was apparently doing well enough in a military way to worry the government of the country, not to mention some people in Washington.

"He's already got about a quarter of the country under his control," Mac had told me, briefing me on the assignment in his second-floor office in a shabby old building that isn't pointed out to visitors taking the standard rubberneck tour of the nation's capital. "Except for a few coastal plantations, it's the quarter nobody wants, but still it's real estate, and General Santos rules it in the name of the revolution. President Avila has asked the United States for help. For one reason and another, military intervention isn't feasible right now. We've been asked to do what we can." I said, "Avila? Haven't I read something about President Avila of Costa Verde?"

"Probably," Mac said. The bright window behind him highlighted his clipped gray hair, but made his expression hard to read. "He is not the nicest friend we have down there. But his morals aren't the concern of this department, Eric, nor is the character of his government."

It was an official rebuke, emphasized by his use of my code name. He was reminding me that this wasn't the bureau of bleeding hearts. That was over in the State Department somewhere.

"No, sir," I said.

"The fact is, this Santos gentleman with the boastful nickname seems to have grown himself a beard like Castro and acquired the same kind of friends. The Fidelista movement seems to be quite contagious. Your contact will be a colonel in the Federal army named Jiminez. He'll arrange to get you in and out."

"Cheerfully?" I asked.

"Well," said Mac dryly, "they were apparently hoping for a couple of divisions of Marines. They may be a trifle disappointed. Furthermore, we have already made one attempt that failed. This will complicate your mission in several ways…"

I thought of these complications now, lying with my eyes closed at the side of the jungle clearing. It was going to be a pleasant assignment, I reflected, with my target alerted and my allies disappointed and disillusioned, having already seen the job loused up once by an Americano miracle worker sent to take the place of the troops they'd requested. You could hardly blame Colonel Jimnez for being, let's say, a trifle reserved in his greeting.

It was getting towards morning, and the camp was starting to come awake after some hours of quiet, but I saw no reason to jump up and start functioning. There was nothing for me to do, and somebody might think I was too jittery to sleep. I lay there breathing evenly with my arm through the sling of the rifle case, until a man came to wake me and tell me that there was food by the fire and the colonel wished to inform me that we would march in ten minutes.

South of the Rio Grande-and we were a long way south-ten minutes usually means half an hour, but apparently our diminutive C.O. wasn't one of the standard mauiana boys. In ten minutes we were on the trail, if you could call it that, with daylight showing gray through the tangled jungle. In fifteen minutes I was sweating copiously, although the heat of the day was still to come. The little man set a fast pace. I was in fair condition, but it wasn't my kind of country, and the pathfinders out ahead were picking holes for people their own size. Long~legged gringos six feet four could damn well look out for themselves.

I stuck behind Jimnez, near the head of the column. He never looked back. His faded shirt remained dry across the shoulders. Behind me came the men who weren't swinging machetes out front, and the two women. I heard good-natured grumbling in Spanish and deciphered some of it. It was all very well for their coronelcito to amuse himself by running the legs off the tail Americano, they were saying, but he should take some thought to his own people, who had marched hard yesterday and the day before. It was not a joke worth killing oneself for.

if their little colonel heard them, you couldn't tell it from his stride. He kept us as close to a lope as conditions permitted, with only an occasional pause for breath and food, and brought us to the outskirts of the village about five in the afternoon, after circling wide to make the final approach from inland.

At last I was told that our destination was just over the ridge when we finally came to a halt in a wooded ravine. We'd climbed all day, and this was a different, higher, and dryer kind of forest from the jungle in which we'd started, but it still wasn't likely to be mistaken for the arid New Mexico country I'd hunted as a boy. The ravine was apparently a prearranged rendezvous. A man was awaiting us among the trees, a barefoot peasant type in dirty white pajamas and a big hat. Jiminez spoke to him briefly in Spanish that was so different from my border lingo that I couldn't really follow it. I gathered only that the man came from the village, and that the situation there was favorable in some respects, unfavorable in others.

The man slipped away. Jiminez got the two women and three of the men off to one side and gave them instructions I couldn't hear. The older of the women carried a machine pistol in a negligent manner. The younger packed a rifle as if she knew what it was for. In pants, both looked as tough as their male companions or tougher. I wondered where all the gentle, shy, beautiful little Latin heroines were hiding, the ones 'Who share the hero's bed, or bedroll, in every jungle epic ever written or filmed. Then I wondered what the hell I'd do with one if I had her. I wasn't exactly in the mood. I sat down on a log and rubbed my right thigh, from Which a bullet had been extracted some months before.

"You have trouble with the leg, Senor Helm?" Jiminez asked, coming up to seat himself beside me.

"No trouble," I said. I couldn't have him thinking he had a cripple on his hands, on top of everything else, so I lied a little. "An old injury. It just stiffens up sometimes."

The mixed quintet, male and female, was moving off up the ravine. The older woman seemed to be in command. I assumed they'd been assigned to deal with one of the complications Mac had told me about. Jiminez caught the direction of my look and confirmed my thought.

"They will do what they can when the shooting starts," he said. "I do not have very great hopes for their success, however. There are at least two hundred men in the village, I have just been told. A few of those are paid by us, of course, but they cannot help openly or their usefulness is at an end."

"We're supposed to give it a try," I said. "But it's a secondary objective and they're your people. How hard you want them to try, under the circumstances, is for you to say. Is our primary objective at home?"