John Gilstrap - Hostage Zero

“Does Jose know?”

“Not yet.”

Felipe laughed-a deep-throated peal that came from his soul and brought tears to his eyes. “Well, once Jose learns that the other Mr. Smith is with you, he’ll be very, very trustworthy.”

Jonathan joined him in the laughter. Throughout the world-from Cleveland to Samoa-Boxers was a big man. In South America he made Gulliver look short. Jammin’ Josie was afraid of him at a level that made “terrified” seem like a small word. Boxers had always relished it, and Jonathan had always used it to his advantage.

As the laughter settled, Jonathan killed the frivolity. “We make light of Josie’s shifting loyalties, but I need to know for real if he has gone bad. A child’s life lies in the balance.”

In South American culture, family meant everything, so Jonathan knew that Felipe would understand the urgency.

Felipe’s expression wrinkled. “Your business here is not about drugs?”

“In Colombia, my friend, I’m afraid that everything is ultimately about drugs. First and foremost, though, my business is about a kidnapping.”

“For ransom?” Felipe had been around long enough to understand that not all abductions are created equal.

“Not this time. For controlling information.”

Felipe showed his palms, his fingers pointing down. “What could a child know?”

“I can’t share the details. But I can’t afford betrayal.”

Felipe raised his hand, as if taking an oath. “On my mother’s grave, Jose mentioned your coming only to impress me. For all I know his intentions are good.” He paused. “He just talks too much. Is there a way I can help you?”

“Does the name Mitchell-or Mitch-Ponder mean anything to you?”

Felipe’s eyes darted to the corners of the courtyard. He tried to cover his fearful twitch, but it was too late.

Jonathan smiled. “Felipe, it’s me. You know that I’ll die to protect your secrets.” He said this without hyperbole, and Felipe knew it.

“Senor Jones, I hope that we have been friends long enough for you to know that I do not frighten easily.” This from a man who’d pointed a finger in the face of Pablo Escobar, the mass murderer in charge of the Medellin drug cartel that Jonathan had personally helped to dismantle in the nineties.

“You’re among the bravest men I know,” Jonathan assured.

Felipe said, “This man Ponder frightens me. Because you mention him, I assume he is involved in what you must do.”

“He is.”

“Then be careful. Extraordinarily careful. This man is known here as El Matador. The killer.”

Jonathan made a face. “That’s a little dramatic, don’t you think? With all respect, your country is full of matadors.”

Felipe shook his head emphatically. “Not the same. Not like this Ponder. He reminds me of Pablo. He is that-how do you say it? — ruthful.”

“Ruthless,” Jonathan corrected. “After taking down the original Pablo, I’d think that the wannabe Pablo would be easy.”

“We had two governments and thousands of people working to take down Pablo. Things are different now, no?”

Jonathan didn’t bother to point out that elements of the Colombian government was more hindrance than help the first time around.

“Ponder is a gringo,” Felipe continued. “You know how we Latinos are. Gringos lead, we follow. Ponder has paid the politicians well to allow him to make his cocaine in the jungle. The policia and the politicos all say that they are running the drugs out of our country, but they only care about the makers who do not pay well enough. Ponder, he pays good. Very, very good.”

Jonathan was confused. “So if the pockets are all fat, what’s the killing about?”

“Farmers and villagers who resist are killed in the worst ways. He hacks off hands and feet, then arms and legs as people watch. He makes people suffer horribly before he cuts their throats. He takes villagers’ children to labor in the coca fields. Many parents never see their hijos again.”

A bullshit bell rang in the back of Jonathan’s head. “Come on, Felipe. You make Ponder sound like a monster from a bedtime story.”

“Those stories all come from someplace. I’m telling you, he is the man that children of the future will learn about from their grandparents.”

“It doesn’t make sense, though. You terrorize the people, and they start to plan their retaliation.”

Felipe made a puffing sound and threw up his hands. “It might not make sense to you, but it is always the way things are done.” His eyes twinkled. “When there is no Senor Jones on your side, fear is all that many people have.”

Jonathan caught the barb, but he wasn’t sure how to interpret it. Was Felipe suggesting that he liberate entire villages while he was liberating the Guinn boy? Surely not.

Felipe said, “I still do not understand why a man like El Matador would come all the way to America to kidnap a child.”

“That’s the million-dollar question for us, too,” Jonathan confessed. “But his is the name that keeps popping up. Tell me about these coca fields. Where are they?”

“Places where you have been before, I suspect. In the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. No better farmlands to be found in all of Colombia.”

Jonathan had indeed been there before. He recognized the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta as some of the most punishing terrain in the world, where jungles were impossibly thick, and where Indian tribes lived undiscovered until the early 1970s. The mountain range ran north-to-south just east of the city of Santa Marta and featured Pico Cristobal Colon, which, at 18,000 feet, was the fifth most prominent in the world. Back in the day, it was as lawless a place as any on earth.

Funded by billions of U.S. dollars, the paramilitary groups of the 1990s had been driven out by the Colombian government, but the open secret that no one wanted to acknowledge was that a drug war that attacks only the supply side of the equation is doomed to failure. As long as U.S. senators and their aides continued to party in their private offices on the products that they pledged to eradicate, a native population for whom cocaine is the sole source of income will find a way to keep the manufacturing chain going.

And where incomes are made by breaking the law, there’s always someone smart enough to hijack the process through graft. Political corruption was a constant throughout the world.

Felipe poked the air in Jonathan’s direction. “You need to be very careful, my friend. No one will want you there. And it’s not just El Matador. Heaven only knows who the DAS is working for today-and whoever it is, it could change tomorrow-and the Indians don’t like anyone.”

Jonathan had to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. Truly, Colombia’s national security apparatus- Departamento Administrivo de Seguridad (DAS)-had been more or less up for bid since the 1960s. Every time they’d seemed to find some measure of stability over the years, someone would assassinate someone else, and then it would be time to spin the loyalty wheel again.

The native tribes, meanwhile, had grown weary of being pushed around over the past four hundred years, and they’d become famously distrustful of everyone. Literally, everyone who was not a member of their immediate tribe.

“As long as I sleep with my eyes open and develop three-sixty peripheral vision, I should be okay, right?”

“You make light, Senor Jones.”

“What choice do I have? Unless, of course, you would like to join my team and give me guidance along the way.”

It was Felipe’s turn to laugh. “I will show you a map. I’m not a warrior anymore. I’ve seen too much death. I’ve caused too much of it. I cannot do it anymore.” His eyes narrowed, and he regarded Jonathan with a fatherly glare. “I am surprised that you still can.”