Warren Murphy: Survival Course

Off in the grass, an olive helicopter lifted off with difficulty.

Zamora retraced the footprints back into the museum. They ended at the open spot where the statue of the Aztec goddess Coatlicue-She of the Serpent Skirts-had stood for many years. She stood there no longer.

Umberto Zamora was of mostly Mixtec blood. He believed in the old ways. He believed that Quetzalcoad would one day return to Mexico. Still, he was quite astonished that Coatlicue had stridden away. She was over eight feet tall and made entirely of rude, immobile stone. He noticed the tiny rocky fragments littering the floor, as if Coatlicue had simply shrugged them off.

Then he fell to his knees and began praying to his gods. The old gods. The true gods of Mexico.

Federal Judicial Police Officer Guadalupe Mazatl left the Hotel Krystal in a huff, muttering, "Pock all gringos!"

She was fed up with all gringos. She was sick of the lazy FJP and the corrupt DFS, of every criollo and mestizo who gave in with fatalistic surrender to life's many indignities.

When Officer Mazatl had first joined the FJP, she was determined to be different, not to take bribes or to grovel before the white Mexicans, but to live as an Aztec woman, proud and unbending of spirit.

She had never bent. And as a consequence, she had never been accepted by the mestizo men who complimented her body but secretly yearned for that ultimate Mexican status symbol, a blond woman. In four years with the FJP, she had never advanced beyond officer, and she knew she never would.

But she had retained her self-respect. It was victory enough.

She entered her official vehicle, pride like a mask of her wide brown face, and started the engine.

There was no point in taking this matter to her primer comandante, that cabron. The DFS would be of no help either. She had virtually been an accomplice to the death of Comandante Odio and his men. How could she have been so stupid as to get mixed up with gringos? she wondered.

Officer Guadalupe Mazatl decided that if she was to protect Mexico-the Mexico she both loved and despised-she must go to Teotihuacan.

She pulled out onto Liverpool, turned right on Florencia, past the ridiculous Banana boutique with its King Kong roof diorama which symbolized how far Mexico had sunk into carnival absurdity, and sent the car speeding along the Paseo de la Reforma.

Near the Maria Isabel Sheraton, a DFA vehicle pulled in front of her. It slowed down, forcing her to do likewise. Another DFS car appeared on her left. And a third on her right. They drove in formation until they reached a red light.

There, DFS agents piled out and demanded she surrender her weapon. Officer Guadalupe Mazatl knew better than to refuse.

"What is this about?" she asked as she handed over her sidearm, holster and all.

"You are under arrest for suspicion of complicity in the murder of DFS Comandante Oscar Odio," one agent said. "You will come with us, Officer."

As obligingly as any meek mestizo, Officer Mazatl allowed herself to be bundled into one of the DFS cars.

"DFS headquarters is not this way," she said when the cars turned onto Viaducto.

"We are going to the airport," the driver informed her.

Puzzled, Officer Mazatl folded her strong arms, wondering why. She decided not to ask. Her Indian fatalism had completely reasserted itself. She despised the feeling.

Remo Williams got lost in the congested Mexico City traffic. He stopped in an area of run-down buildings. He kept every window sealed tight. Still, carbon dioxide was coming up through the VW Beetle's leaky floorboards.

"Damn this rental car," he told Chiun. "Remind me to slaughter that desk clerk who arranged this."

"I will leave you what still quivers," the Master of Sinanju said. He breathed through a scarlet kimono sleeve held over his nose.

Remo spotted a Mexico City traffic cop astride a motorcycle parked in a no-parking zone. As much as he hated to roll down the window, he did. Being lost in Mexican traffic hell was infinitely worse.

"Hey!" he called over. "Point me to Teotihuacan?"

The traffic cop put a hand to his ear. "Que?"

"Teotihuacan," Remo repeated. "Comprende?"

"Ah, come closer, senor."

Remo sent his car closer to the white-lined zone where the officer was parked.

"Closer, senor," the cop repeated.

"Teotihuacan," Remo said.

"Closer," the cop said, wiggling his fingers invitingly.

And when Remo had the car nose-to-nose with the motorcycle, the officer dismounted, pulled out a ticket pad, and said, "Oh, senor, you have crossed the white line. Now I must give you a ticket."

Remo looked down. His front tire barely touched the white no-parking line.

"But you told me to come closer!" he protested.

"But I did not give permission to cross the white line, senor."

Remo got out of the car. He ripped the ticket pad from the man's hands, tore his gunbelt free, and as a final expression of displeasure, stomped the motorcycle into an agony of spare parts.

"Teotihuacan, senor?" the cop said quickly. "Go norte."

"Point," Remo said. "I forgot my compass."

The suddenly smiling traffic cop obliged. Remo said gracias in a metallic voice and got back into the car.

Twenty minutes later, they were driving past a cemetery set in the foothills of one of Mexico City's towering sentinel mountains. One side of the mountain was a beehive of tar-paper and cardboard shacks, set cheek by jowl.

"I can't believe people live like this," Remo muttered.

Past the mountains, the terrain flattened and was dotted with feathery trees and the occasional rosepink chapel. The air became cleaner. But not clean enough to induce Chiun to breathe it directly. Remo's head was pounding now. It was still like breathing unadulterated car exhaust. The pit of his stomach felt cold, like a spent coal.

"How do you feel, Little Father?" he asked.

"Ill," Chiun croaked through his sleeve.

"Wonderful," he muttered, noticing the sign that said SAN JUAN TEOTIHUACAN. "We're walking into one on the worst situations in our lives and we're freaking basket cases."

"We are Sinanju," Chiun said wearily. "And we will prevail." Then he coughed. Remo had never heard his mentor cough before, and it frightened him.

Chapter 25

The question was put to Officer Guadalupe Mazatl by the fat man the others called, with slimy deference, "El Padrino."

"Que quieres? Plata, o plomo?" In English: "What do you want? Silver, or lead?"

DFS Primer Comandante Embutes held a Glock pistol to Guadalupe's smooth brown forehead. She knelt before El Padrino, her eyes more shamed than frightened. It was the question she had dreaded back in Tampico. The narcotraficantes would give other FJP officers the same choice: accept bribes and look the other way, or die.

Guadalupe's lower lip trembled. She had thought she knew what her answer would be. But she was without a pistol now. And as El Padrino, who was dressed like an Acapulco gigolo, looked at her with feigned indifference, she muttered the word that tasted of bitterness.

"Plata," she said, adding, "No me mates, por favor."

The pistol was withdrawn.

Comandante Embutes said, "Very wise, senorita. Now you will tell us all about the americanos, and their presidente."

The words tumbled out of Guadalupe's Mazatl's mouth. She told them everything, about the false Vice-President, about the speaking statue. They scoffed at first, but when she produced the videotape, they scoffed no longer.

El Padrino's video machine played the scene over and over in the plush stateroom of his Lear jet. The cabin was very silent except for muttered curses.

"Josip Broz Tito, eh?" El Padrino said finally, turning to her. "Tito was a good man. Perhaps we can bargain with him, eh?"

"He wants only to survive," Guadalupe muttered abjectly. "That is what the gringos have said. To survive. "