‘Get down!’
William Pettigrew looked at him uncomprehendingly.
‘Lie in it, fucker!’
The priest looked at the paint and hesitated.
‘Get on with it,’ the youth’s face turned pink as he struggled to find the right words, ‘motherfucker!’
Another boot caught Pettigrew in the small of the back. Forced down into the puddle, his shirt and trousers were immediately soaked in the cloying green paint. Lying still, he felt a small pulse of satisfaction that he had managed to get dressed before opening the door. To be both naked and green would have been a terrible embarrassment.
Of course, it was also a waste of good paint, but that seemed a total irrelevance now, since it wasn’t as if he would be coming back to start the decorating.
A boot tickled his ear. ‘Why didn’t you stay away, dickhead?’
It was a good question.
William Pettigrew was well known locally as a so-called ‘Red Priest’, a liberation theologian and, therefore, a troublemaker. That meant that he was always likely to be on someone’s list. When the coup began, his friends had warned him that he would be a target; that he should lie low, maybe even leave the country for a while. Pettigrew was lucky — he had that option; he had a passport and he had money. He could go back to Great Britain and leave this all behind. On several occasions, the Archdiocese and the ecclesiastical governors had made it clear to him that this was a course of action of which they would approve.
He had toyed with going to Scotland — his great-greatgrandfather had been an innkeeper in Montrose — to see for himself where the Pettigrews had first come from. But, deep down, he knew that was just a fantasy. He would never run away.
In the event, he did leave Valparaiso… for a little while. After a couple of nights of listening to the shooting, he had headed for a village twenty kilometres up the coast, where he spent a couple of nights on a friend’s floor. The whole thing quickly seemed melodramatic and self-indulgent — cowardly, even. By running from his fate, he had put himself in a prison of his own making. After all, Cerro Los Placeres was his home. There was nowhere else to go. There was nowhere else he wanted to be.
He knew that he had to suffer with the people here, share the suffering of the powerless, the impotent. He knew that he could offer his neighbours no solutions to this terrible situation. He didn’t know the answers. But he could walk with them, search with them, stay with them. Die with them.
His only weapon was forgiveness. Forgiveness is fuelled by love; violence is fuelled by fear. Love is the antidote to fear. And he knew that love is what he would need in his heart when he arrived at the gates of Heaven.
So he came back.
For a couple more days, he went about his business in Valparaiso unmolested. It seemed that no one cared about William Pettigrew.
Until now.
Another kick brought him back to the present. More words were whispered in his ear:
‘You are an idiot as well as a pervert.’
‘Do you think God cares what happens to scum like you?’
‘You should have fucked off back to England, while you had the chance.’
‘The Church shrinks from blood but we do not.’
After a couple more kicks, and a few smacks around the head with a rifle butt, Pettigrew’s hands were tied firmly together in front of him. Careful to avoid getting any of the bright green paint on their fatigues, two soldiers hauled him towards the rear of a canvas-covered truck. Half-lifted, half-pushed, he was bundled inside. There were maybe ten or twelve other people already in there, but no one that he recognised in the gloom. They instinctively shied away from him, fearing any association that could make their situation worse. Righting himself, he found a space near the tailgate. Shouting and laughing came from outside the truck. Inside there was only a pensive silence, laced with a heavy dose of fear.
Five minutes later, the tailgate was closed and the canvas flaps at the back of the truck pulled down. Someone shouted to the driver that they were ready to go, and the truck rumbled into life. After a few more seconds they set off, travelling at a steady pace of not much more than twenty miles an hour. Out of the back, through the gaps in the canvas, Pettigrew could see that they were being closely followed by a group of three soldiers in a jeep. One was manning a machine-gun mounted on the back, just in case anyone decided to take their chances and jump. No one did.
It was clear that they were heading south, towards the port area. Pettigrew had been what they called a ‘worker priest’ in Valparaiso’s Las Habas shipyards for almost a year, so he knew this route well. He also knew why they were going there. A couple of naval vessels had arrived in Valparaiso two days before the socialist government had been overthrown. With the President, Salvador Allende, dead, and ‘leftists’ of all descriptions being rounded up, rumours quickly began circulating that these ships were being used as overflow facilities for the prisons.
‘A nice bit of sea air — and free board and lodging,’ someone had joked at the time. ‘A lot better than Londres Street,’ the man had added, referring to the Communist Party headquarters in Santiago which, as everyone knew, was now being used as a torture centre.
Pettigrew had looked at him askance.
‘Like a little vacation really.’
Really? Well, his vacation started here.
They moved slowly through the streets. The city seemed desolate even for the middle of the night. Lights were out. Windows were closed. Doors firmly bolted shut. People were curled up in their beds, worried that they might be next, wracking their brains for any behaviour, any words, that might lead to a midnight visit and a one-way trip to Las Habas.
Even the dogs that habitually prowled the dustbins looking for food had the sense to take the night off.
Inside the truck, someone started sobbing. Another began quietly reciting the Lord’s Prayer. At the end, there were a couple of ragged Amen s, followed by more silence. A woman close to Pettigrew squeezed her rosary so tightly that the string broke and the beads fell to the floor, scattering at their feet. She glanced at Pettigrew and shrugged. He said nothing. They both knew that it was far too late for God.
They made four more stops on the way. Pulling up outside houses that the priest didn’t recognise; picking up men and women whom he didn’t know. At each stop, two or three more people were shoved into the back of the truck. There was some shouting, a few screams but no real complaints and no resistance.
By the time they reached the dockside, the truck was full. The driver slowed his speed as he pulled onto one of the piers. Through the gap in the canvas, Pettigrew caught a glimpse of a distinctive four-mast schooner, the Dama Blanca. The White Lady was a familiar sight in Valparaiso, being the training ship for the cadets at the city’s Arturo Prat Naval Academy. He had even been on board once himself, during an Open Day early in 1972. Visitors were given a tour of the bay, some free rum and a rather boring lecture on Arturo Prat and his good works.
This time, no doubt, the programme would be rather different.
Despite everything, Pettigrew managed a smile when he recalled Agustin Arturo Prat Chacon. Prat was a very Chilean kind of hero. He took a bullet between the eyes in 1879 while fighting the Peruvians.