“A most excellent operation,” said the general. “Muy excelente. The world thinks that a crazy American tries to shoot the president of the United States and accidentally hits this pious bystander. And nobody knows it’s really justice reaching out to kill a communist priest.”
He had a pockmarked face and a dark mustache. He was dressed in evening clothes, including a red plaid cummerbund. He wore a high-polish stainless steel Colt 10mm Delta Elite in a shoulder holster. Shreck had noticed its ivory grips when the general had bent to pour the wine.
“It was an expensive operation,” Shreck said.
“Cheap, whatever the cost.”
“And oh-so-very necessary,” said Hugh Meachum. “That archbishop was going to get the Panther Battalion investigation opened again. And he had the president’s ear, too. And how very, very embarrassing for many people that would have been.”
“It was wonderful,” said the general. “Tell me, though, Colonel Shreck. The great shot that brought this communist priest down. A great shot, no?”
“A great shot, yes,” said Shreck.
“Who do you have who could make such a shot? What a shot! It is truly an amazing shot.”
“It was,” said Shreck. He himself wished he knew who hit that shot. Whoever he was, the guy could shoot, maybe better than Bob Lee Swagger.
Shreck looked over at Meachum, who only twinkled, as if he’d had a bit much to drink.
“I would someday,” said the general, lifting his wine, “consider it an honor to shake this man’s hand.”
So would I, thought Shreck.
“We will convey your sentiments, of course,” said Hugh Meachum.
“It was muy excelente,” said the general. “Perfecto. Number One.”
Shreck almost said, Yes, except for the asshole who got away. But Meachum had warned him not to raise the subject. The general was somewhat touchy.
Shreck took a quick glance around the baronial dining room of the de Rujijo estate; outside, in the twilight, a vast garden undulated over rolling land down to a pond, a perfect oval, inscribed into the earth so that the setting sun would reflect dazzlingly off of it at twilight. Beyond was the jungle; and beyond that, the sea, a gleaming band some two miles or so away.
“You should know, Colonel Shreck, that for us it did not go perfectly.”
“Oh?” said Shreck.
“But not to worry.”
“Oh my,” said Hugh Meachum. He took another sip of wine.
“A traitor. Yes. A traitor.”
Shreck nodded, waiting, thinking, oh shit, what now?
“Who learned of our arrangement. And fled.”
“Messy,” said Hugh Meachum. “Very messy. Certain people will not be pleased.”
“Not to worry,” the general repeated.
“And why not, sir?” asked Shreck.
“The traitor was betrayed himself. He was hiding in Panama. When he finally thought it was safe, he flew to New Orleans. To the FBI. But we were waiting. Do you remember the wonderful electronic surveillance vehicle your organization provided to our intelligence service?”
“Affirmative,” said Shreck.
“With this, we tracked him. We made certain it was our Eduardo, and we eliminated him in a manner that communicates to all who know of such matters our seriousness of intentions.”
Shreck nodded.
“And now I drink,” said the general, “to my brave compadres and to the glorious future of our two nations.”
“Hear, hear,” said Hugh Meachum.
Fuck you, thought Shreck.
The next morning, waiting for the helicopter that would take him to the airport for the jet back to the United States, Shreck stood in the meadow before the great house and looked at the sea. It was a gray day, windy and moist, with a chill in the air surprising for the tropics. The chill made him think of the mornings in Korea, when he’d been just a kid, and all the times he’d sworn in Korea that no matter what happened to him, he’d never be cold again in the morning.
But he felt cold.
“Colonel, you are all right?”
It was General de Rujijo, now in his camouflages with his black beret. The high-polish Colt automatic hung in a shoulder holster under his left arm.
“I am fine, sir,” said Shreck.
“You look under the weather, Colonel.”
“No sir. Not at all.”
“Good. I have a little present for you. From my very own archives.”
He snapped his finger and an aide brought over a briefcase. The general reached inside and pulled out a black plastic box that Shreck recognized as a videotape cassette.
“I record all my battalion’s operations,” said the general. “For training purposes. This is a copy of the action on the Sampul River. You should find it educational, how well our troops mastered their lessons.”
Shreck had an impulse to smash the man’s skull in. But he smiled grimly and took it from him.
“I have many more,” said the general. “You may have that one.”
“Yes sir. Thank you, sir.”
The general smiled with courtly dignity, saluted and when Shreck returned the salute, he turned and walked away.
Shreck looked at his watch; the chopper was late, nothing ever happened on time in this goddamned country.
“Colonel, you seem especially morose today.”
Of course it was old Hugh, who was never quite as drunk as he seemed, even if, at eleven A.M., he had a gin and tonic in his hand and a pinkish hue to his face.
“That asshole just presented me with a tape of the Sampul River job. I guess the point he’s trying to make is that we’re all in this together, like it or not. If he goes down, the tape reaches somebody important and we all go down.”
“The general is a practical man.”
“It makes me sick that a motherfucker like de Rujijo thinks he’s got us. He reminds me of some of those shit-ass gook generals in their fucking jumpsuits who made it out in seventy-five with a couple of hundred million bucks in the sack.”
“Raymond, I’ve always appreciated your tact. You never say what you think, do you?”
“I don’t get paid to think, Mr. Meachum. I didn’t go to Yale, like you did. We both know that.”
“Of course not. Well, the general. The general has his uses. He’s a dreadful man, a war criminal most certainly. A great importer of la cocaína. But he and he alone was not responsible for what happened with the Panther Battalion troops on the Sampul River. We made that mess, too. You, Colonel, too. You were there. Those were your trainers in the field. And, if we are to be responsible adults, we must clean it up.”
That didn’t really satisfy Shreck of course: it was too easy.
“We did what we did,” he said, “in perfect awareness of the consequences and the risks – and the costs. We did it because we believed in the long run it would save far more lives than it took.”
“Indeed we did. That, after all, is the sort of calculus they pay us for, isn’t it? But that same principle extends to this last operation, which you implemented so well in New Orleans. It costs us two men – an intellectual bishop with a surprisingly intractable moralistic streak, and a beat-up war hero who’s a complete gun nut. If we don’t use those men, and somehow the archbishop’s will prevails and it comes out about Panther Battalion, and who did what and why, then the left and the right in this bloody little country will never ever get together. There will be no treaty; the fighting will go on, the thousands will continue to die – ”
“Come on, Mr. Meachum, that’s not what worries you. What worries you is that the lefties might win here, even as communism is crumbling or has crumbled all over the world, and we’ve kicked ass bigtime in the Persian Gulf. That’s what sticks in your craw.”
The old man smiled one of his mischievous Meachum smiles, then faded behind a mask of remoteness.